


The Little Things

by temporalDecay



Series: distrait shorts [16]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Flushed Romance | Matesprits, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-13
Updated: 2014-06-13
Packaged: 2018-02-04 11:32:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,083
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1777513
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/temporalDecay/pseuds/temporalDecay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which it's Karkat Vantas' wriggling day and Eridan Ampora is surprisingly good at making the little things into a big deal.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Little Things

**Author's Note:**

> Set after [_Light Beyond My Reach_](archiveofourown.org/works/1510520), unrepentant fluff.

When you were three sweeps old, you figured out your husktop enough to actually watch movies with it, which was inherently cheaper and easier than saving up credits for perigees until you could buy the physical copies – which would take even longer to arrive, if they ever did. You refuse to acknowledge that Sollux had probably more than a little to do with it, in retrospect, more on principle than anything else. But you remember your first find fondly if vaguely. It was a shitty romcom that not even you could dress up as anything other but a shitty romcom, full of clichés and bad acting and terrible special effects. But it was funny and there was something deliciously illicit about having downloaded it without paying for it, on your wriggling day no less. 

You don’t remember the title anymore, or even who the actors were – it was a dated production even then, and everyone involved in it had probably been culled for sheer incompetence afterwards, it was so deliciously _bad_ – although you made a habit of watching it on your wriggling day all the way until you were nine, at which point the world went jaw-droppingly, absurdidly, absolutely bonkers on you, and you had to leave childish things behind. You stopped really celebrating your wriggling day after that, too, because it became more of a national holiday, in the wake of Feferi’s rise to power and your appointment as High Chancellor, and less of a personal celebration of the fact that you’d beaten the odds for a whole sweep again. 

It’s been centuries now, literally, which is why you’re so genuinely surprised when Eridan summarily carries you off from your desk – you yelled maybe four curses before snuggling into his chest, the ridiculous, melodramatic twit, but only because you love him – and takes you to one of those big, unused blocks in the palace but before you can even ask what’s going on through his empty skull this time, the music starts playing and the big display screen on the wall shows very familiar images that make nostalgia slam up against the back of your teeth so hard you think you might actually start sobbing. 

“You did not,” you say, awed and touched and perhaps wibbling a little as he settles into one of those ridiculously expensive and comfortable couches that abound in the palace, snuggling you into his chest. 

“’course I did,” Eridan croons, smug and pleased as he nuzzles the top of your head, “are you doubting my requisition powers, Chancellor? I keep your stupid pretentious tea in stock on _Alternia_ , this was nothing.” 

It’s very much not nothing and you end up laughing in delight as you shove against him. You’re almost used to living in the palace, as opposed to your ship. It’s almost idyllic some nights, working on a schedule based on the sun and the moons, instead of a howling siren, leaving the windows open in your study, if only to enjoy the fresh sea breeze on hot summer nights. It’s almost too good to be true, and part of you, the part that remembers Alternia, the part that remembers the fear and the self-loathing, keeps expecting the other shoe to drop. You still wake up some nights, and take a moment to remember it is not a dream. 

“How did you even do this?” You whisper, as if afraid of interrupting the atrocious opening scene of the movie. 

“In the interest of full disclosure,” Eridan whispers back, rubbing his knuckles against your side soothingly, “this was a joint venture with Sol. You’ve been bloody miserable over the stupid schoolfeeding board, and we thought it’d be good to do something nice for you.” There’s a pause. “Well, okay, _I_ thought it’d be good to do something nice for you for your wriggling day, Sol wanted to prank you and make you believe he’d deleted all the files in your husktop. I negotiated.” 

“Well fuck, that’s not ominous or anything,” you laugh, relaxing into his arms, “oh fuck, this is just as terrible as I remember it.” 

“Haven’t watched it yet,” Eridan admits, hesitantly, even as he wraps his arms tight around you. “You told me once about it, but I didn’t really care because… you know.” You hum in the back of your throat, appreciating, with some effort, the fact he’s keeping himself from a self-deprecating tirade. “So I was browsing our logs, looking for something to cheer you up and I accidentally went back all the way to the beginning.” He pauses a little. “Like, _all the way back_ to the beginning.” He doesn’t apologize, though you can tell he wants to. Instead he presses his lips to the side of your head and says: “I love you,” instead. 

“I love you too,” you reply, tilting your head back so you can catch his lips with yours. “I’m almost afraid to ask how Sollux fits into all this.” 

“Well,” Eridan smiles, that dumb, stupid, smitten smile that makes your insides melt ever since you realized that smile is _yours_ and yours only. “I have requisition superpowers, sure, but that doesn’t help much if you don’t know _what_ you need to requisition.” He pauses, uncertain, as if weighting whether he should tell you some more or not, and then, in true Eridan fashion, he can’t help but preen. “Turns out there aren’t any… full copies left out there, anywhere. So we kinda had to… piece it back together from all the stuff we found. So a few bits are a lil’ spotty. Sol helped a lot cleaning it up, though, you almost can’t tell. But I also got a few copies reprinted, just. Just so you can watch it whenever you like. Wherever you like.” He reaches out to the small table nearby, and pulls over a small plastic box, just like they used to make them, when you were a kid. “I just. I thought you’d like to have the physical thing, instead of just the file. Because it’s nice to hold something.” And then, anxiously. “Do you like it?” 

You kiss the stupid moron until he’s purring beneath you, and you’re definitely going to have to restart the movie because you’ve missed everything into the second act by now. 

“Happy wriggling day, Kar,” Eridan says, in that quiet, reverent way of his that makes your insides knot themselves up with unnamable feelings. 

“The happiest,” you promise, and proceed to enjoy it to the fullest. 


End file.
